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Other Editorials

I am very excited about the plans for recovery of Detroit homes that will be available to buyers who are moving in and fixing them up to live in them. Mayor Mike Duggan has the right idea, and more power to him.

I am also excited about the plans for attacking the problem of blight in the city and its removal. It’s a good thing that we’ve got Dan Gilbert fighting this fight.

But it’s time for the citizens of our community to extend the removal of blight even further.

I think we’ve got a couple of examples of industrial blight that we have to figure out how to handle and what all our options might be: the former Packard plant and the Michigan Central Depot.

Certainly, the new owner of the old Packard plant deserves some time to come up with a plan and the money to get rid of this horrid example of industrial blight in our city.

The plant has become one of the poster children of Detroit that everyone who visits our city with the idea of doing the latest great story ends up using as the photo example. It almost always seems to run on the front page of some faroff newspaper or a television news segment exemplifying decay in Detroit.

The plant has been vacant for half a century and shows it. If there is some value to the plant, it would seem to have eluded everyone except the new owner, who must have some ideas for this rubble.

I only hope that he has a statute of limitations on his plans and that we, Detroit, don’t have to be embarrassed by it for another 50 years.

That brings me to the granddaddy of all industrial blight, our infamous abandoned railroad station.

That has been empty for more than 25 years and must be the top-ranked example of city blight — not only in the city but the nation.

I am very sorry that the owner doesn’t seem to be affected by all the negative publicity it has generated for him and the city.

Whatever his master plan is for the station, it’s been a secret all these years.

We have to figure out how to encourage both of them to do something about their very ugly eyesores that are the worst things about blight and Detroit. And in spite of the great examples of what our mayor and Gilbert are doing, these are two examples that are outside their purview.